Hot, Hot, Hot

There are sporting events that have garnered such fame that they are known by one name, without even an article.  Henley is officially the Henley Royal Regatta.  Wimbledon, is the common reference to The Championships, Wimbledon. 

In running there is Badwater – officially known as the AdventureCORPS Badwater Ultramarathon.  It is a 135-mile race starting at 282 feet below sea level in the Badwater Basin, in California's Death Valley, and ending at an elevation of 8360 feet at Whitney Portal, the trailhead to Mount Whitney. It takes place annually in mid-July, when the weather conditions are most extreme and temperatures over 120 °F, even in the shade, are not uncommon.

Saturday was the final installment of the RMRR MTS race held at Twin Lakes Park and I experience my first warm weather racing of the year.  The temperature was about 70 °F at 10:15 when I finished.  Not exactly Badwater-esque, but it was a shock compared to the 40 °F weather two weeks ago.  I finished first in the 20 mile race with a time of 2:13:15, just a few seconds off my PR for that course, not bad for a guy who is seven weeks shy of his 49^th birthday.  While my average pace was just under 6:40 / mile, I wilted in the last few miles. 

That got me thinking of how I should prepare for possible warm weather for the Colfax Marathon, which will be held on May 19th.  I recall running the inaugural Colfax Marathon.  It was so hot, I was sweating just standing at the start and the temperature was in the 80s at the finish.  Derek Griffiths, publisher of the Colorado Runner magazine had sponges and buckets of water around mile 20.  (A note on sponge protocol – bend over when you squeeze the sponge over your head, otherwise you will have shoes full of water.) 

Racing in hot weather is sometimes unavoidable.  The best we can do is to mitigate the effects hot weather has on us.  Some marathoners have found drinking glycerol to be beneficial during long runs in hot weather because it prevents dehydration, a major cause of fatigue.  Chris McCormack, two time winner of the Ironman World Championship, wears extremely dark sunglasses and pulls a visor low over his eyes to give himself the mental sensation of being cool. 

We spend so much time avoiding running in hot weather that are bodies aren’t used to running in the heat.  I have had particularly bad races in the heat, most notably the Greenland Trail 50 Km race in May 2011.  It just makes sense to acclimate yourself to running in hot weather.  In fact, some people are known to train for Badwater by running on a treadmill in a dry sauna.  This prepares the body to deal with the blistering heat. 

To get acclimated to hot weather I donned a long sleeve technical shirt, shorts, disposable painter’s coveralls, a baseball cap and even put a bandana over my face so I’d breathe hot air.  I then shuffled around my deck from 11:00 until 1:00 on Sunday when the temperature was in the 70s.  By the two-hour mark my tongue was starting to stick to the roof of my mouth.  The side benefit was that I did this while I was staining my 400 square foot deck.

For What It’s Worth

There was once a group of happy people.

They laughed often.

They played games and ran around because it made them feel good.

Their lives were filled with joy.

They had many friends.

They looked for the good in the world.

They were brave.

The Sun shone upon them.

At that same time there was also a group of very angry people.

They lived in the shadows.

They were filled with hatred, fear and anger.

They were cowards.

They did not have friends and were often lonely.

Because they did not understand why other people were happy, they chose to hate them.

They saw the happy people and wanted what they had. 

But they did not ask for it, which the happy people would have gladly given them. 

Nor did they try to take it for there was nothing physical to take.

Instead, they tried to destroy it.

But it could not be broken.

runnerguy48

After a race it is good to do a little self evaluation.  Here are some thoughts I had about last week’s Platte River ½ Marathon. 

After the usual first mile shake-out, runners generally track along the course in the same relative positions.  I gradually reeled in two runners, passing one in the eighth mile and the other in the tenth mile.  When I looked back at that time I saw a runner gaining on me.  Somewhere in the 11^th mile I looked back and saw that guy was getting closer, close enough to notice that he was probably in the masters division. 

I fully expected him to overtake me within the next mile and started planning my race strategy.  I would pace off him and rely on my speed to sprint past him in the last half mile.  But, he never caught me.  In fact, I increased my lead on him over the last few miles.  At the final aid station I took a quick peek over my right shoulder and couldn’t see him.  I took a longer look as I turned onto 8^th Avenue and he hadn’t yet made it to the aid station.  I didn’t fade like I had in past races.  While my 12^th mile was my slowest at 6:29, the 13^th mile, which includes climbing the 8^th Avenue viaduct, was 6:26.  While I was running the race, I was at my limit physically, but a minute after the finish I felt great. 

Again, the Kenyan breakfast of tea and ugali after a late meal the night before kept me in good stead.  It occurred to me that corn meal is gluten free.  Much has been made of Novak Djokovic’s gluten free diet  and how it contributed to his recent success.  Could this change in diet be helping me?

What happens when in the latter stages of a running race?  The lactic acid builds up.  Your muscles are screaming.  Your body temperature sky-rockets.  All of this leads to decreased performance.  There is mounting evidence that gluten contributes to these problems and eliminating gluten from the diet could be the key to better performance. 

Our diet has changed dramatically in the past century, especially in Western countries.  It is a trend that's spreading around the world due to the globalization of commerce, and the food industry in particular.  The problem is not just wheat, but also processed dairy and sugars, all of which we consume more regularly and in higher quantities than ever before.  You might think bread and pasta are healthy foods, but essentially they break down into sugars like a chocolate bar does and this is not an energy source that human bodies evolved with.

To give up wheat-based foods would mean giving up my beloved pasta and pizza.  But according to Pete McCraw tennis coach for some of the world’s top ranked players, cutting out wheat-based foods could be the best thing I could ever do.

I am reading Finding Ultra: Rejecting Middle Age, Becoming One of the World's Fittest Men, and Discovering Myself by Rich Roll.

Finding Ultra is Rich Roll’s incredible-but-true account of achieving one of the most awe-inspiring midlife physical transformations ever.  In October 2006 Roll, a former Stanford swimmer, was nearly fifty pounds overweight and unable to climb the stairs without stopping.  He lost that weight, competed in the elite Ultraman competition and completed the Epic5 - five Ironman-distance triathlons, each on a different Hawaiian island, all completed in less than a week. 

One key to Roll’s success was changing his diet to one that was completely plant-based.  Finding Ultra is a portrait of what willpower can accomplish.  It challenges all of us to rethink what we’re capable of.

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Sunday was the second RMRR Spring Marathon Training Series race.  I ran the 20 mile (double out-and-back) course in 2:16:57 averaging 6:51 / mile.  It was cold and windy.  The temperature at the start was just under 40 degrees and the wind was screaming at about 25 mph.  The last few miles of each circuit were brutal.  Give me a hill any day instead of wind.  At least with a hill, you can see when the suffering will end. 

Tomorrow is the Boston Marathon.  I hope my mates rest easy today and the weather treats them well tomorrow.

Maureen’s Race

“Lord, please give me a downhill course with a tailwind.  I promise I won’t blow it.”

Runner’s foxhole prayer

I first saw Maureen Roben in 1993 at a seminar at the Greenwood Athletic Club before the Denver International Marathon.   It was to be my first marathon and I wanted to be prepared and to avoid mistakes; I failed at both.  My time was about 3:25.  I ran the first half in 1:25 and it took me two hours to run the last half. 

At the seminar they showed a video of Maureen racing in The Goodwill Games.  Maureen told a story about meeting Kip Keino.  The one piece of advice I remember twenty years later is that you want to feel a little bloated before the marathon.  I have had no trouble following that recommendation.

Years later Randy Rodman invited me to run a few workouts with Maureen’s group at the West Middle School.  I have seen her many times leading her charges in Team in Training and Run Strong workouts along the Highline Canal Path. 

Maureen’s accomplishments are remarkable.  She qualified for four Olympic marathon trials.  In 1986 she set a Colorado record for the ½ marathon with a time of 1:14:08.  In 1987 she was the top female marathoner in the country and graced the cover of Runner’s World Magazine.  She placed seventh in the 1988 Olympics.  She describes her highest honor is being elected into the Sportswomen of Colorado Hall of Fame. 

Through the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training program, she has prepared over 5000 athletes to complete marathons and half marathons.  She led the Team in Training program for 14 years.  As the owner of Run Strong (http://www.run-strong.org/about/2-about-maureen-roben), Maureen prepares personalized programs, weekly workouts, and running related clinics including nutrition, injury prevention and form evaluation.  She has a program called “Spikes” for children ages 7 - 18.  She created the Aetna Park to Park 5 and 10-Mile races as well. 

Maureen is the Co-Race Director of the Platte River Half Marathon / Buckhorn Exchange Relay which was held today.  The weather was perfect.  The temperature was 38 degrees at the start and there was a nice tailwind to push the runners along.  You couldn’t have asked for better conditions. 

Platte River Half Marathon is the fastest growing half marathon. 

Year	Finishers
2003	247
2004	346
2005	744
2006	856
2007	822
2008	800
2009	1138
2010	1551
2011	2235
2012	2415

It has all of the attributes of a great race:  downhill course, beautiful scenery, great support and nice SWAG.  If only they could flatten the 8^th Avenue viaduct.  You never know what you might discover on the Platte River path.  One year the dead body of a homeless man was found on the course just before the race started. 

The conditions were perfect for today’s race.  My time, 1:21:45 (6:15 per mile), was a personal best.  I was the first old guy, finishing a little over a minute after the first female, Heather Utrata.  I passed the ten mile mark in 1:01:48, a full minute faster than last week’s RMRR 10 miler.  I recall looking at the time in disbelief.  Could I really be moving that fast?  My slowest mile was the 12^th in 6:29. 

It was a good showing for the Phiddipides Track Club.  Scott Daily, my training buddy, was the third old guy.  Jay Survil, bib number 2222, won his age group. 

It was a perfect race.  The best part was having Mary and the girls at the finish line.

How Much Marathon Training Do You Really Need?

That was the question posed by a recent article from Active.com.  The article proposes a 14 week marathon crash course.  The plan includes quite a few 100m and 200m repeats.  It has been at least a decade since I’ve run a 100m or 200m track repeat.  The plan also recommends long runs with 5 miles race-pace surges.  It would be good to incorporate that kind of workout into my training. 

There are seven weeks to go until the Colfax Marathon.  I have done only three runs of 20 or more miles.  I have little confidence I can run the marathon distance at a decent pace.  My speed training is producing good results, but I wonder if I have the stamina for 26.2 miles.  This year I will be racing up to the marathon distance.  Lucky for me, the RMRR has their Spring Marathon Training Series (MTS). 

Today was the first edition of the series.  Because I am running the Platte River ½ Marathon next weekend, I ran the 10 mile option.  I covered the course in just under 63 minutes – 6:18 / mile pace.  I will have the opportunity to run two twenty mile races in the next month or so. 

I stumbled onto a new pre-race eating plan which was quite helpful in today’s race.  My daughters attended the Andrew McMahon concert on Friday night downtown at the Marquis Theater.  Because we are helicopter parents, Mary and decided to make it a family outing.  Mary and I dropped the girls off at the venue and had dinner at the Buenos Aires Pizzeria, which is about a block away from the Marquis. 

We had:

Napolitana Salad (Fresh mozzarella, Tomato, Red Onion, Fresh Basil, Black Olives, Oregano, Olive Oil, Red Vinegar ) and Arugula Salad (Arugula, Caramelized Pears, Red Onion, Olive Oil).  We shared a large pizza which was half Chapita (Mozzarella, Pineapple, Jalapeño, Fresh Mint Leaves) and half Recoleta (Mozzarella, Asparagus, Roasted red pepper).

We had a few hours to kill before the end of the concert, so we went to the Rock Bottom Brewery to watch the NCAA basketball tournament. Mary had a Milk Stout; I had water. It was 11:00 when we got back to the van and I was hungry, so I ate a slice of cold pizza.  Does anyone remember how good cold pizza tastes? 

I was pleasantly full when I got to bed at midnight.  I awoke six hours later and had a Kenyan breakfast of tea and ugali (see my last blog).  Having a late meal before going to bed and a lighter breakfast helped me.  I felt well-nourished, but not stuffed and I had no gastric issues before or during the race. 

This year the Phidippides Track Club underwrote singlets for its members.  They look great.  Steve and Ryan wore them during today’s race.  I wore my Syracuse singlet in honor of my alma mater’s basketball team, which beat Marquette to advance to the Final Four of the NCAA tournament.  I will be wearing that singlet next Sunday at the Platte River ½ Marathon either in mourning or in celebration depending on how the Orange perform Saturday night against Michigan. 

Running, Vicariously, with the Kenyans

Have you ever thought about moving to Kenya to train for a marathon with the fastest endurance runners in the world?  What would that entail?  Obtaining a six month sabbatical from your job.  Purchasing jewelry to get the green light from your wife.  Taking your children out of school and exposing them to a totally different culture.  Making all of the arrangements. 

Well, Adharanand Finn did just that, and he wrote a book about it.  I am reading Running with the Kenyans: Passion, Adventure, and the Secrets of the Fastest People on Earth.  It is a very interesting story.  I can identify with Finn.  His personal best for a half marathon was 1:26 before going to Kenya, so he'd slide right into our training runs.  (read his blog -http://runningwithkenyans.blogspot.com/)

Finn uprooted his family of five, including three small children, and traveled to Iten, a small, town in the Rift Valley.  Iten is a mecca for long-distance runners thanks to its high altitude, endless running paths, and some of the top training camps in the world.  There are hundreds of world-class runners living in Iten.  It is probably the only place where you could miss-dial a 2:04 marathoner’s phone number and speak with a 2:05 marathoner. 

Finn ran with Olympic champions, young hopefuls and barefoot schoolchildren.  He wanted to find out why the Kenyans dominate long-distance running and kept a record of their “secrets”.  Is it the shoes, or Kenyans’ lack thereof?  The food, or lack thereof?  The high-altitude training?  Is it the active childhood that often includes running to school and the lack of easier modes of transportation?  Is it Kenya’s pervasive running culture, their desire to win at all costs, and the simple lack of job alternatives?  The answer is yes to all.

Here are some of my observations:

There is a concentrated group of very fast runners.  They are single focused – they run, eat and rest, that’s it. 

Competition is fierce to be one of the few runners taken to major races.  The rewards are significant and life-altering for these poor athletes.  A few thousand dollars in prize money allows a runner to buy a big enough farm, with cows, to provide a comfortable future for his family.

They run mostly in groups.  The runs I’ve read about so far have not been that long, an hour to an hour and a half.  Those group runs start at a relatively easy pace, around 7:30 / mile, and get progressively faster until they are a race pace.

They train at 8,500 feet above sea level which is like us training in Woodland Park. 

Their diet is very simple and almost entirely plant-based.  Their favorite food is ugali, a polenta-like dish made from corn meal and water. 

The kids run to school, mostly because they don’t want to be late.  Teachers hit the late students with sticks.  Some run over three miles each way.  Most of them run barefoot.  In contrast, my elementary school was about half a mile from my home.  My high school was about a mile away.  I never ran to, or from, school and I wore sneakers even to the beach. 

When they are not running or eating, they rest.  By rest I mean they sit around or sleep.  One famously fast runner was notorious for sleeping 16 hours per day!  Imagine how much faster you’d be if you got over twice as much sleep as you do now.

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In other news, this week’s Phidippides track workout was the annual two mile time trial.  I ran the distance in 11:18, three seconds faster than last year. 

Spring Training

It is St. Patrick’s Day.  Opening day of the 2013 Major League Baseball season is two weeks away, the same day as the RMRR’s Spring Marathon Training Series 20 mile race.  The Easter Bunny will be hopping the next day.  The azaleas are in bloom at Augusta National.  The third Monday in April, Patriots’ Day, is a month away and the Boston Athletic Association is in full-on marathon readiness mode.

Cherry Creek State Park was full of activity this Saturday morning.  Runners and bikers deftly avoided one another the paths.  The report of rifles could be heard from the shooting range.  The air was calm and there was the buzz from the radio controlled airplanes at the airfield.  Wildlife of all sorts, real and imagined, could be seen.  A coyote bolted after its prey.  Deer were sunning themselves in the fields by the road. 

On the lake crew shells bobbed in the swells.  The air and water temperatures were about the same, 40 degrees.  It reminded me of the first on-the-water workouts we had on the Erie Canal.  The launches would power back and forth on the river to break up the ice.  With almost every stroke, we would hit a chunk of ice, sometimes missing water completely.  That first spring my hands ached from the cold, then never again.  I can only imagine what nerve damage I did to my hands.

Friday was unseasonably warm with temperatures around 70 degrees.  That was enough of an invitation for about 100 campers in RVs to come and hook up for the night.  But the low of Friday turned into the high of Saturday, which made for a chilly wake up.

We were commenting on the few long runs we’ve put in so far this year.  By this time last year I had logged eight runs of 20+ miles.  This was my third 20+ miler of the year.  I ended up running 21.5 miles at an average pace of 7:14 / mile.  If I could hold that pace, it would yield a 3:09:25 marathon, which I would be delighted with.  My legs were sore like I'd run a marathon on Sunday and I needed to rest.  I have two months to get ready for the Colfax Marathon and I need more long runs.